Day 685: I have decided that these corpses are not going to bury themselves. I will attempt to find every dead person on the entire damn island and bury them.

 

I have found someone who died near these cabins on the shore of the coastal highway. Three wolves guarded the area. Had to kill them before attempting burial. It was nice to finally hear the sound of silence as the crows finally moved on.

 

I decided that since I went through so much effort to clear out the wolves, I should take some time to replenish my supplies at the cabin here. This could take a few days, considering the pile of frozen meat I left here from before. Still, the wood supplies are low, so I should top them off.

Day 686: Damn, Where did all these burned out torches come from? I can't believe how many I just tossed into this pile here. I need to do something about this.

Day 687: Something has changed. I toss and turn. I know I cleared out the end of the railroad. I know it. yet, something in the back of my head nags me. I can't take it anymore. I need to go back to the hunting lodge. I forgot something. I know it.

Day 691: I hate this forlorn muskeg. This wide expanse of open ground gives no cover and there are so many wolves. However, while I was trying to make my way through a pack of wolves, lining up the kills near to each other so I would only have to light one fire to harvest them, I heard a howl behind me. I turn around and fell off a rail, just a few feet, but I let out a yelp. And apparently this scared the crap out of the bear stalking up behind me. I got to see it's tail bobbing up and down as it ran off, turning right, and then scattering the pack of wolves I was picking off, one at a time.

 

This trip is going to kill me. I hope my mind was right.

Day 692: This is impossible.

 

I looted this place. I looted like it was going out of style. And yet, there are planks lying around. A pallet I missed. A few cardboard boxes. HOW? How this get here? This makes no sense...

Day 694: I've found a few... misplaced things. It's odd. I don't remember this furnace in the corner. However, there is no real proof that someone was out here. No activity. No movement. I didn't come out here to forge anything, I came looking for things I missed and the only thing I found was a can of lighter fluid. I did find a corpse. I remember this guy.

 

He's still frozen in this cave a year later. I found a bunny gleefully hopping over him. I put a rock upside its' stupid head and broke its' neck with a satisfying crunch. I hate these rodents.

 

Found a second corpse along the long curve to the rope that drops down near the machine shop. With the weather, it took me two days to bury them both. It occurred to me I need to take a trip down into the ravine. I hated it last time, but I need to make another pass to bury every corpse. I'll have to bring more meat this time.

Day 695: I found a large cache of wolf skins and bunny pelts. I don't remember making this. However, it's in the cave I was hunting out of, given the number of snares I found outside the cave. However, when I used the snares, two broke. Maybe this was what was bothering me. I'll have to drag this back with me. I don't know why, but I do. That and I need to sweep the area for corpses.

Day 696: I just noticed that the clock in the Lodge is set to noon. It's the only clock I have seen that wasn't frozen at the time of the first flare. I wish I could afford to bring this back to the Quonset. It would never survive the trip. I wind it up and set it going. It starts to tick and tock. Slowly... then in regular time. I close my eyes and remember back to a time when clocks ruled the world.

 

Everything was scheduled. Everything happened in turn. Everything had a time. Everything had its season. A rolling series of crisis as we all moved from moment to moment, deadline to dead line, preparing for the next turn of the wheel, the chime of an alarm, the heart beat of a bygone age.

 

Is it better this way? A simpler time, certainly. Now I am govern by actual crisis, not Artificial ones. I am a master of my own destiny, but the price that was paid for this so called freedom?

 

Life seeks to create order and to propagate that order. Some order conflicts. Here at the lodge, there are the rabbits. They wish to copy themselves, to spread their version of order. The wolves disagree and these forms of order conflict. We call this chaos, when it is far from chaos.

 

Chaos is formless and without purpose. The conflict of purpose isn't chaos, it just appears to be such because we are lacking order to a degree.

 

The age of clocks is over. What was the age of clocks? An attempt to create order. not just order, but higher and higher forms of order until we reached height of order never before even dreamed of.

 

Some say that this was bad, but really what they were complaining about was the KIND of order, not the existence of order. This is where people got confused. Like the forest talkers. They thought that nature was a kind thing. It is not. It is various forms of order that all want to murder other forms of order. We, humanity, the masters of order, had won the battle.

 

Until the first flare.

 

We depended too much on certain forms of order. We built our pyramid on shaky ground. When the foundation crumbled, so did the pyramid. And many people died. I imagine there are some who would welcome this simplistic life, but only because they don't know how amazing order is. They are blind to it, because it is everywhere. They assume that you can remove some of the order, and the rest will function without it.

 

It is all interconnected. Layers upon layers. Wheels that turn wheels. Just because you don't understand something doesn't make it evil.

 

I will start a fire and place my bedroll before it. I will lie down and watch the clock, listening to the fading heartbeat of a world already dead. Or maybe it is not dead. Maybe, as long as this clock stands here next to this fireplace in silent vigil, a time will come in the far future when clocks will rise again, and bring order back to the world.

697: MUSHROOMS!!! I FOUND MUSHROOMS!!! 9 MUSHROOMS!!! NINE! NINE NIIIIIIINNNNNNENEEEEE MUSHROOMS!!! How did I miss them? HOW IS THIS POSSIBLE??? Did they grow in the year that I was gone? I don't know. I really don't know. But I have found mushrooms. With the shroom I have back at Quonset, I should be able to make 5 reishi tea. Yes. Yes I am now glad I came here. It has been worth it to add more tea to my collection.

...

And a car battery. I remember this. Vaguely. It will be difficult, but I will try to get it back to the garage.

...

Moose. By the bridge. It is in-between me and the maintenance yard.

...

Now I remember why I hate this place. When it rains it pours. Sneaking up on the moose, I in turn get snuck up on by a bear. Fortunately there were wolves stalking me who noticed the bear and ran off yelping. So I shot the bear and got lucky. Damn thing dropped on the first hit. Unfortunately I ran from the bear, attracting the moose, I have no idea how I side stepped a charging moose, but I did. Hit him in the ass as he went by, then took a long shot as he went over the crest of a hill. Dropped him.

 

Then the wolf came back.

 

Not too difficult to deal with, but they just never let up. And as soon as I prepare to get down to harvesting, damn blizzard starts driving me inside. I hope my kills are still there. Problem is I only wounded the wolf. No idea where he went. I hate letting kills go to waste.

698: These damn wolves are taking forever to clear out. I did find another body in the back of the machine shed. Buried him today. I'm going to go out and clear the lake, then bury the guy frozen sticking out of the ice.

...

 

MORE MUSHROOMS. How is this possible? I cleared the place out. While searching for more, I spot a wolf. I give a rabbit a kick in the right direction. The wolf goes for the bunny, then gets an arrow upside the head. Don't have time to grab the meat, because I found someone dead past the wolf. three hours later, he's buried. I look over the ledge to see what is in the ravine. Nothing. No crows. Nothing. I assume there's nobody dead down there.

 

Another wolf showed up. guess he wanted the bunny. I gave it to him WITH EXTREME PREJUDGES!

 

...

 

Follow the crows to another corpse. He's just sitting there. Slumped up against a tree. Maybe he was trying to get to the maintenance yard and the many wolves kept him up here.

 

Putting this one in the ground takes so long the sun sets. The view is spectacular.

 

...

 

I take it back. The view sucks. Damn blizzard rolled in as soon as I wrote that. Forced me back to the truck by an electric trolly. Took some time to harvest this rabbit the wolf caught. Waste not, want... something. I forget.

 

Now I get to watch this broken railroad bridge for god knows how long. Funny, I though the train was pointing the other direction. My mind is playing tricks on me. I wonder what is on the other side of the broken rail bridge.

 

 

 

699: This is insane. I just swept the whole area last night. SIX MORE WOLVES try to jump me. Hauling this inside will take forever.

704: I spend three days hauling meat and cooking. I cooked so long I forgot to sleep or eat. Man I feel like crap. And I still have to make it up to the cave and get those hides I left up there. And that car battery. That is going to be a pain hauling back to Quonset. However, I think I will leave all the metal here. I might come back and just turn all this scrap metal into arrow heads or something. Not sure.

 

...

 

GOD DAMN WOLF JUMPED ME! Where the HELL are they all coming from???

 

Almost got my ear wraps. I only got one spare pair back at Quonset. G'damnit. This is the most wolf infested part of the island.

705: Great. Finally healed up, and there is a blizzard as soon as dawn breaks. I hate this place. Going to get back to systematically breaking down everything into raw materials

708: Done breaking down this maintenance building. Didn't finish the yard. Got a few hundred pallets to break up, but that's just wood. I think I'll leave this hatchet here. It's almost dead anyways.

...

Two more wolves? WHERE ARE THEY COMING FROM??? -- SIGH. I'll regret it if I don't harvest the meat and leave it in a cache for later. This is going to cost me time. -- AND the fog rolls in. GREAT.

 

Time to try an old trick. I'm gonna take a quick nap in this tree. If you find this, I fell out and died.

 

Okay. The fog is lifting, and I am running out of daylight.

 

Goddami I ned to stop siseeing. Damn jul snuck up behind me because I couldn't hear it next to this fall. Got me good on the arm. I'm glad I'm leaving this godforsaken broken railway.

709: I expected to get much further, but I can't risk going into muskeg with damaged clothing. I have to make camp at the tunnel. I do not have enough wood up here to stay here if things get dicey. I'll have to hope the weather doesn't turn bad or I might lose a few fingers on my other hand to frostbite.

 

Dammit. it's this damn moose hide. I don't NEED it. Why am I hauling it back to Quonset? How many moose satchels do I have already? 4? 5? Dammit, it's the only way to make more leather. I... can't figure that out, but this is the only way to make more leather and I love these gauntlets. I don't understand why only moose hide makes good enough leather for my gloves, but there you go. I should have made the satchel back at the machine shop and harvested it for the leather, but g'dammit, I want to finish reupholstering the bathroom. That tile floor is mighty cold and moose hide is so soft and warm.

 

....

 

ANNNND AURORA! OF. FUCKIN. COURSE. Well, guess I'm waiting until morning.

ARE YOU KIDDING ME??? MORE WOLVES???

 

Now I just killed a bear and 5 wolves. Fuck.

 

And now I'm at the train in the middle of this hellhole and I hear more wolves. FUCK.

713: I found mushrooms. I got attacked by a second bear and I tracked him down after shooting him in the rump. He died next to a cave I never knew about. I also found so many mushrooms it's not funny. You know what? I've got a place to cure hides. So I went back and got all those wolf hides left on those wolves I killed. I think I will spend some time scouring the place.

...

Now I know where I am. I did some shipping through here to the Orca X. Damn shame what happened to the Orca. I need to rest up. This cave will do nicely. I wonder if I'll find any more moose up there?

 

...

 

Oh yeah. Forgot about this guy. He died in the back of this cave surrounded by coal. I wonder what happened to him? Ah well. I'll drag him out to the overlook and bury him up there.

 

I don't believe it. A cured birch sampling. I so need to repair my arrows.

 

Dragging the corpse out on the overlook resulted in finding a second corpse. I buried both of them and it took so long the aurora came on. Very eerie staying in the cave during an aurora.

714: 2 more wolves. More rose hips and OMB.

 

Another dead man. This one with 5 bullets and a rifle. Damn. Maybe I do need to spend some time here in the muskeg. I need to move the hides to the cave and the loot to the abandoned train. Then, when the time comes, I'll just have to packmule it. g'admit it. I can't leave those wolves to rot, can I? Crap.

716: Well. fortunately those wolves led me to more mushrooms. Unfortunately I am in the middle of a 2 day blizzard.

 

Awwww... I remember this frozen spit of land. It's where I killed my first moose! Good times... good times...

 

So THAT'S where that wolf I winged wound up!

 

 

 

717: So Uhhh... after killing another 6 wolves and getting very worried I did NOT pack enough arrows... I... found... some... floating meat.

 

In the air, floating.

 

Not in the water. Floating about 4 feet off the ground.

 

It was just... hovering. And when I touched it, it just acted like...

 

I'm... thinking... I'm... uh... Yeah.

 

 

 

Okay, while checking out the floating log, I fell off a cliff. I think my ankle is busted. No place to camp around here. I think this is a bad omen. I'm turning back. Not going to make it to the forge.

 

Great. Blizzard.

 

718: I... can see levitating drawers. And the file cabinet's drawers have sunk into the floor. I don't know what to write. I think I've completely lost it. This is impossible. I'm going to bury Bob and not think about it.

 

Bob is the body that's been frozen in the corner of the camp office for the past two years. FYI.